Just out of curiosity how are the various blu-ray players with playing rentals which have a tendency to be scratched, scuffed, ect. The reason why I ask is that even though my A3 HD-DVD player was a champ at playing the discs that I purchased, I don't think any of the 8-9 titles that I have rented from netflix have ever played all the way through without some kind of playback issue. Some of them were pretty scratched up but others seemed to have precious little more than average wear and tear on them and would still freeze, ect. despite my best efforts to clean them. I also did update to the latest firmware so that shouldn't have been an issue. The point is that I am curious if anyone here has a blu-ray player and if they do rent Blu-Ray discs from netflix and if so what kind of results they are getting. I understand that by nature both formats will be more sensitive to imperfections on the disc, but the fact that I haven't been able to play any of the rentals without some sort of glitch occuring in the playback makes me wary of both formats since rentals IMHO are crucial. So just curious as to what people's experiences were and if they could list what player they had and version (1.0, 1.1 or 2.0) and firmware just so I can get a better idea of what to expect in the future.

I think the protective coat from Blu-ray and HD DVD is better than DVD. I had netflix (not anymore now) and rented a few blu-ray and hd dvd discs and they all came in excellent condition. The downside of netflix is that most of the good titles are short wait to very long wait. I think the ones that scratch a lot are from Blockbuster and Hollywood video but I can easily ask them to clean the discs.

The netflix discs I have now look to be pretty scratched up but play with no issues.

I guess it's just the protective layer that is scratched and has no issue on playability

Once again though, are we talking about Blu-Ray or HD-DVD? As mentioned above I had all kinds of problems with HD-DVD rentals from netflix. It didn't matter if it was all scratched up or just had a few minor scuffs or how well I cleaned the disc. Then again, I could've just had a semi-defective unit with a weak laser. Either way I sent it back to Amazon for a full refund. I can't afford to spend $180 on something and not have it be able to play most rentals without issue. I was just curious if anyone had noticed a difference with playback issues from netflix on Blu-Ray versus HD-DVD?

I have only rented a couple Bd's from Rodgers Video (Canada) and had no issues. They looked like the typical rental DVD's that you see. Makes me wonder what people do with these discs? On the other hand I bought Ratatouille yesterday and noticed a couple of stutters about 3/4 through the movie. Checked the disc afterwards and it looks perfect. Pretty sure this is the only time I have seen the player stutter. Didn't help much did I?

So it sounds more like I got a unit with a weak laser than anything else. Glad I returned it. I think I am going to wait for a bit and see what happens next.